He may have been raised amid the splendors of Paris, but globe-trotting fashion photographer Nathaniel Goldberg lost his heart to a simple country cottage in New York's Hudson Valley

Living Room

Living Room

If there werea movie character based on Nathaniel Goldberg, the Paris-raised, New York-based fashion photographer whose work has graced countless magazine covers and ad campaigns for luxury products, the character's home would probably be a soaring loft in Chelsea overlooking the Hudson River. There would likely be the usual slabs of angular white furniture, walls covered with aggressively contemporary art, and nubile models swanning in and out.

But in the real world, Goldberg stands clad in jeans and a gray hoodie at the door of a cozy-yet-somehow-formal 1820s Greek Revival house two hours north of Manhattan in Columbia County, as his Labradors, Arthur and Henry, gambol in the garden. "I don't live a Hollywood life, a fast life," he says with a slight French accent, standing on a simple coir rug. "When I'm home, I like things to be comfortable. I like a lot of peace."

In the living room, the 18th-century Swedish sofa and trio of wood cocktail tables are from Galerie Stéphane Olivier in Paris; the wingback chair, 1940s French iron-and-wood armchair, 1930s étagère, and 1940s American floor lamp were all found in nearby Hudson, New York.

Goldberg with his Labradors

Goldberg with his Labradors

His house, a rambling place with lots of small rooms and a copper roof, seems both quintessentially old-school East Coast and typically French-a perfect reflection of Goldberg himself. It is both rustic and full of refined details, a grand and bold mixture of high and low. There is a liberal assortment of 19th-century pieces, mid-20th-century French finds, and thrift-shop treasures; only the kitchen appliances and the switch plates are new-and he hand-distressed those switch plates himself. Goldberg, who spends his professional life composing perfect shots that somehow avoid slickness, cultivates the same casual rigor in his home: There are pairs of items everywhere, though they are often separated-chests of drawers, sconces, settees-so his visual discipline never seems contrived or stiff. The house's shrewdly cultivated quaintness is tempered by just the right amount of ruggedness, with many walls and sills left untouched. "I'm not afraid of decay," he explains.

Nathaniel Goldberg with his Labradors, from left, Henry and Arthur, at his property in New York's Columbia County.